Today, cured or dried tobacco is containerized in a sheet and transported from the farm to the warehouse where the tobacco is sold and thereafter the sheets of bulk tobacco are taken off the warehouse floor by the manufacturer or processor and taken to a processing plant for further drying and processing. Typically, the bulk tobacco is placed in a burlap type sheet and the respective corners are pulled up over the formed pile of tobacco and opposite corners of the sheet are tied into a square knot or other type knot. In the end, the sheet is secured about the tobacco by a pair of knots with each knot being formed by opposite corners of the sheet. During the course of transferring and handling the tobacco the corner knots will be lifted by a hoist-type device and during the course of the lifting the respective knots will be pulled and in fact the weight of the tobacco will be supported by the respective knots during the course of lifting. This causes the knots to be pulled and tightened very tight. This gives rise to a basic problem at the warehouse and at the processing plant. The knots have to be untied. Often, the knots have been pulled to such an extent that it is virtually impossible to untie the knots.
Workers with pliers and other instruments pull and work at attempting to untie these very hard knots but often it is impossible to do. In many instances the individual attempting to untie the knot gives up and the knot is cut from the sheet with a knife or other type of cutting instrument. This, of course, has the effect of destroying the sheet and in the end this costs the tobacco farmer, the warehouseman, and the processor or manufacturer.
It is common in certain geographical areas for the tobacco farmers, warehouseman and processors to form a Sheet Board of Trade that controls the issuance of these tobacco sheets. Typically, the farmer, the warehouseman, and the processor contribute proportionally to the Sheet Board of Trade and these contributions are used by the Sheet Board to buy and maintain sheets and to administer the sheet program. As pointed out above, one of the major problems facing Sheet Boards today is that the knots tied in the sheet becomes so tight that workers are forced to cut the knots and in the process sheets are destroyed. This has become a real problem over the years and continues to cost tobacco farmers, warehouseman and manufacturers or processors substantial.
Therefore, there has and continues to be a need to develop an improved method of handling tobacco that will save sheets and prevent workers from having to cut knots in the sheet which ends up destroying the sheet and costing farmers, warehouseman and processors.